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okay so I've been playing a bunch of No Man's Sky, a game whose main unique feature is its mind-bogglingly huge universe of procedurally generated planets, most of which have still never been encountered by human players. when you make first contact with an undiscovered planet, it starts out with a random name. just today I've discovered Snesfin, Inkiew, and Roranbu-Anuki. but a minute ago I landed on a planet with, and I must stress this again, the randomly-generated name of:

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love wins etc.

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a BRILLIANT read, and even more incentive for me to make my own wizards trope-defying and excellent.

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He is taking it seriously

He is just not any good at it

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You know, when I was a wee twentysomething during this album’s release, the CEO to worker salary ratio was less than 100:1. Now it’s about 300:1. So Aerosmith didn’t get the point across — maybe someone can do a cover version in a more welcoming environment?

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But not OMD (Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark)?

I get REO Speedwagon and ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) confused

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also pls tag the first game you remember playing

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“I need the biggest seed bell you have.”

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art trade for @anininas 🍬

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What age were you when you had total access to the internet *on the computer?* (no time/usage limits, no parental controls, easy access to stable internet, etc)

- 10 or younger

- 11-12

- 13-14

- 15-16

- 17-18

- 18+

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Oh. OH.

This post is *not* about calligraphy with a brush.

The do’s and don’ts of writing a Chinese character

Note: I say Chinese characters but tbh given how western society can’t seem to really tell the difference between eastern Asians sometimes, this could probably apply to other EA ethnicities. 

Also this is written in the context of writing Chinese characters in realistic world setting, not in a high fantasy... that is a monstrosity of its own.

Also my parents are Han Chinese, (but we speak canto at home). There are multiple ethnic groups in what is now called China. (Heck I think I might make a post on how diverse China and the Chinese diaspora is).

Don’t

Give us yellow skin. 

I don’t think people understand where this stereotype came from, much less, why it’s considered offensive. The tl;dr? It reinforces fake racist science which is used to dehumanize racialized minorities . The long answer: ok so you know how race is not inherently biological, but rather a social construct? No? Oh dear ok. I don’t know how or what 23andme are selling, but there is no biological basis for race, as in ‘there are no inherent biological differences between racial groups.’ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10519151/#:~:text=The%20current%20concept%20of%20race,6

This incredibly dangerous idea that race is biological originated from the pseudeo-science phrenology, which in the late 18th and early 19th centuries to "prove" the ‘unintelligence and uncivilized nature’ of mostly Black people. In the context of yellow skin, it was used by Europeans to identify East Asian people in order to uphold white supremacy, by ensuring that we would not be considered ‘white’ and thus, not have access to the benefits of white privilege. (Michael Keevak. Becoming Yellow : A Short History of Racial Thinking. Princeton University Press; 2011. Accessed July 19, 2025.). So don't give us yellow skin, but that being said, if you want to give your Chinese a darker skin tone then rice paper that's fine. I have relatives with dark skin tones. My skin changes like a rabbit when it's winter vs when it's summer in Canada. I know ppl reading this might not know a lot of Chinese ppl. But like, it's not unheard of for a Chinese person to have a dark skin tone?

Don’t switch Eastern Asian culture interchangeably with others

Ok. There is a caveat to this. I know plenty of Chinese diaspora who lived in Vietnam as refugees. I know people who grew up with both Vietnamese and Filipino parents. But what I mean is, do your research; don’t switch eastern Asian culture interchangeably with others. Yes, eastern Asian cultures have influenced each other very much given our long history and close proximity to each other, (like at some point, Japan, Korea and Vietnam did use the Chinese writing system yes) but you’ll figure out how to portray that, if you do your research right. 

Mock our accents

(Sighs deeply.) Do I need to discuss why someone should not mock one’s endeavors to try and learn something new? 

Make us sexual deviants

I find this is more of a Japanese stereotype, but I’ve read my fair share of one off mentions of one dimensional Chinese characters who are portrayed as people with weird sexual fetishes (in one short story, the only thing that one Chinese character ever did was like… get murdered and the only thing the author had to say was how the Chinese character was a pervert (eye roll)). 

Dos 

Ask yourself why you want to write a Chinese character 

No seriously, why do you want to write a Chinese character in particular? I don’t mean this in a, ‘how their ethnicity must serve as a plot point’ b/c that’s just stupid. You can totally create Chinese characters just because you want to. But like, what do you mean you want to? Like are you just doing this as a diversity checklist, because people can tell when you're doing that.

Ask yourself what does ‘authenticity’ mean to you 

If you plan on doing research by looking at biographies and memoirs or just read anything written from the perspective of a Chinese person, you might be asking what you can do to write ‘the authentic Chinese experience.’

Ngl, I myself an Canadian born Chinese person wrestle with this question at times. what I don’t like tho, is how some peoples concept of authenticity is used to shut down and exclude other peoples experiences simply because they don’t ‘seem’ authentic enough. Like? What? Even the most common experiences won’t truly be universal, because there will always be exceptions. 

Things I (personally) dgaf about 

Note: this is totally open to dispute from my fellow Chinese diaspora Believe it or not, we are not a monolithic hive mind. We can disagree with each other. 

Martial artist trope

So an important concept of martial arts is that anyone can cultivate and learn discipline through martial arts. It’s not a biological thing to know how to do martial arts though, and I think some ppl need to understand that. 

Dyed hair/steaked hair trope 

I remember one time, I asked my mom why I am not allowed to dye my hair, and she asked me why I would ever dye it in the first place? Since my current hair colour was what I inherited from my ancestors. …Wow mom, way to use the ancestors against me. 

I know there are ppl who say dyeing a Chinese characters hair colour is a form of exotic-fication. I can see where they are coming from. The reality is tho, there are Chinese ppl who dye their hair all the time. Just not everyone. So maybe put some Chinese characters who kept their natural hair colour. You can tell Turning Red (2022) was made by a Chinese person tho, bc she didn’t make the protagonists hair purple, she made it red. 

Bilingual Characters

I’ve seen American born Chinese people mention that they want LESS BILINGUAL Chinese characters… At first, I thought it was because in America, they don’t see that knowing another language as a sign of intelligence but now I’ve realized they were probably talking about how they want a Chinese character to be alienated from their parents culture through the portrayal of not knowing a dialect of Chinese. That is fine, like that adds complexity to the character’s personality and backstory. I personally, though, would have benefited from having more fictional role models who spoke Chinese freely in an Anglophone world un-apologetically , and I’ve worked with kids who probably could have used a similar role model too. But that's just my opinion.

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Hey, that’s where my wife’s boyfriend lives!

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When I was a kid in the 70s, my grandma watched the Lawrence Welk Show. He and his band played music from the WWII era. You know, for old people.

When I’m in my car these day I usually listen to the 90s alternative station, because it’s what I was listening to on KROQ as a young adult.

I definitely do not think about how closely these time gaps match up.

I saw someone post about how Leon Kennedy likes divorced Dad rock and I assumed that they meant like Credence, Pink Floyd, Yes, Led Zeppelin...

Which in 1998 would've made sense. That's what my then middle aged Boomer parents would've been listening to.

But then I realised they were talking about the CURRENT generation of divorced Dad rock like Blink 182, Foo Fighters, Sound Garden, Nickelback etc

Which in 1998 would've been new releases.

Then I remembered - oh yeah now I'M the middle aged parent. Ow my back.

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Not the identical idea, but in the same ballpark (she has to get married to *somebody* to collect an inheritance; hey, friend I’ve known my whole life, we both need the money, let’s get married and split it!)

My favorite fanfiction trope is one I like to call accidentally fake real married and I don’t even know if it’s a real trope but basically it’s the idea that two characters get married accidentally and then they have to pretend that they got married because they love each other and while pretending to love each other they actually fall in love. I’ve literally only read two fics with this trope and they are literally the same story with different characters. Like in both fics the characters are celebrities or have some sort of following in their world, they get drunk Vegas married, post about being married on Twitter, and then are forced to pretend to be married on purpose to save their reputations all while planning a future divorce that will never end up happening as they realize they are actually in love with each other. I love this trope and I could read a million fics with the same premise but I don’t know if there are any more outside of these two so if you’ve read a fic with this premise I would love to know

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im joining the war on gross disgusting pornographic content on the side of gross disgusting pornographic content